How accurate is Google Earth & Maps?

According to Reuters, Google Earth has been asked to help look for Steve Fossett whose plane went missing a few days ago. Let's put to one side the privacy issue that Branson could ask for and receive preferential treatment.

I've been using Google Earth to plan a few paddles. Long term schemes. Far off ideas. Dreaming, really. They're remote places, so Google Earth will probably be accurate. Won't it?

I just looked close to home. Over the last three years, the BBC has been building a whacking great glass box on the banks of the River Clyde in Glasgow. It opens officially on 20th September.

Honestly, you can't miss it. But Google Earth does. Or rather Google Maps, which I believe draws its data from the same source.

That piece of wasteland below, seen from space, is where the above building now stands. So if you're planning a trip remember, what you see might not be what you get.